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A Minnehaha County jury needs more time to decide whether to convict a homeless man of murder in the death of a campmate last year.

Eugene “Eddie” Martin, 45, testified in his own defense Tuesday before the case went to the jury at 4 p.m. Jurors went home after failing to agree on a verdict and will try again today.

A conviction for first- or second-degree murder would result in an automatic sentence of life in prison without parole. The manslaughter charge carries no minimum and a maximum of life in prison.

Prosecutors say Martin killed 45-year-old Robert Thunder Hawk with a shovel on May 3, 2012, for talking about Martin’s girlfriend. Martin maintains that a co-defendant, Clint Cottonwood, delivered the fatal blows.

Martin said Cottonwood killed Thunder Hawk after he left camp to buy more beer, telling jurors Cottonwood had attacked his longtime friend earlier in the day.

Cottonwood, 53, who testified last week, pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter this summer. The older man called a pastor friend to report the killing hours after it happened, and the pastor called police.

The three men were drinking together at a campsite in the 1100 block of North Cliff Avenue the day of the murder.

Prosecutors urged jurors to listen to Cottonwood’s version of events: Thunder Hawk’s talk about Martin’s girlfriend angered Martin and prompted him to first beat Thunder Hawk, then kill him as the injured man bled into the dirt.

Minnehaha County deputy state’s attorney Crystal Johnson told jurors that Martin’s actions amount to premeditation, an element of the crime of first-degree murder.

“He realizes he’s gurgling, choking on his own blood, and he picks up the shovel and kills him,” she said.

Deputy public defender Mike Miller told jurors that Cottonwood’s testimony didn’t add up. He showed jurors photos taken of the two defendants’ hands after their arrests; Cottonwood’s were clean but Martin’s were dirty.

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“Look how clean his hands are for being homeless and living in the woods,” Miller said. “These look like the hands of somebody who’s cleaned himself up. He cleaned away any evidence.”

Martin was caught on the scene, just a few feet from Thunder Hawk’s body, which was covered by a tarp. When asked about a body, the still-intoxicated man said, “What body?”

Miller reminded jurors that Martin and Thunder Hawk had known one another for decades, while Cottonwood never liked Thunder Hawk and didn’t want him at the camp. And it was Cottonwood who told the first officers he saw that “I killed a man,” and that he “did a bad thing.”

Johnson told jurors Miller was asking them to make assumptions that weren’t supported by the evidence. Cottonwood directed officers to the body and cooperated from the start when he didn’t need to.

Martin, on the other hand, couldn’t remember anything about the crime in the days following the murder, even telling his girlfriend he wasn’t sure if he’d killed Thunder Hawk.